Qin Shi Huang was the first emperor of the Quin dynasty and the first to unite the kingdoms living in the Asian country. The tomb is located in one of the most famous funeral complexes in the world, but archaeologists have described it perfectly, they are not yet ready to open it. It’s not because they’re afraid of a possible curse. There are several reasons, and they are (somewhat) more mundane.

The emperor’s tomb is only part of the 3rd century BC funerary complex. The most popular feature of this complex is the army of terracotta sculptures discovered in the 1970s. About 8,000 life-size statues of warriors are believed to guard the necropolis, and with 2,000 unearthed, new statues are still found. Last remaining 2022.

The mausoleum of the emperor who carried China from the warring states period to the imperial stage is here. in Shaanxi provinceIt is in central China and is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

But one hill resists the archaeologists’ tools. The emperor’s tomb is still intact. Anthropologists and historians recognize its immense value, yet they refrain from exploring it in depth. There are important reasons for this, some more mundane and others that might remind us of Indiana Jones movies.

For example, the first are possible pitfalls. It is perhaps the least relevant because some are unlikely to be. 2,200-year-old traps may continue to work. It is also unknown whether these traps actually existed or were invented by officials or historians of the time to deter potential looters. After all, imperial tombs are a meaty target for them.

But there is one element that deters archaeologists because of the danger it poses to their health: mercury. Mercury rivers. This possibility is also based on writings from that period, but there are scientific indications that this element was found in abundance in the tomb.

A 2020 study published in the journal Nature Discovered by Chinese researchers Mercury traces around the necropolis in larger quantities than expected.

Mercury was used as a decorative element, not as a trap, when drawing water from the rivers into the tomb. An extreme version of using aluminum foil in Bethlehem. Mercury was curiously a metal associated with life, but it may have been the cause of death for the emperor who had his mausoleum built before he died in 210 BC.

Archaeologist Kristin Romey, familiar with the archaeological field, LiveScienceand it’s partly out of respect for the elderly, but they’ve realized that no one in the world right now has the technology to go and dig properly.

Experts they fear that exploring the tomb might harm it. After all, it is impossible to know whether the wall opened to enter the tomb contains valuable inscriptions. Exposure to external elements (air or water) can also damage the contents inside. Not to mention the possibility of structural damage to the mausoleum.

Previous experiences require caution. Perhaps the most paradigmatic example is the city of Troy, the ruins of which were discovered on the Anatolian peninsula and have wreaked havoc with archaeological research. There are also such examples in Egypt. Certainly the most famous tomb of North African civilization has also been explored by invasive methods.

“Consider all the knowledge we lost based on excavation techniques in the 1930s when we entered King Tut’s tomb. There is so much more we could learn, but the techniques back then were not what we have now.” .

Decision on when this shrine will be opened ultimately owned by the Chinese government and apparently still waiting for technical advances to come that will minimize degradation of heritage during exploration.

While some techniques show promise, we’ll have to wait for now. In Egypt, new techniques are already being used to “scan” the interior of pharaonic tombs. New techniques such as muon use are also promising, and the idea of ​​applying them to the Qin tomb is already in the minds of some. For now, we’ll still have to wait to solve the mystery. And trust that the secret of the curses is not in a metal river.

Cover image | Peter Griffin, CC0 1.0